Alternative splicing in plants: current knowledge and future directions for assessing the biological relevance of splice variants.

Alternative splicing is an important regulatory process that produces multiple transcripts from a single gene, significantly modulating the transcriptome and potentially the proteome, during development and in response to environmental cues. In the first part of this review, we summarize recent advances and highlight the accumulated knowledge on the biological roles of alternative splicing isoforms that are key for different plant responses and during development. Remarkably, we found that many of the studies in this area use similar methodological approaches that need to be improved to gain more accurate conclusions, since they generally presume that stable isoforms undoubtedly have coding capacities.

A Comparison of Use Topography and Nicotine Pharmacokinetics Among Loose and Portioned Smokeless Tobacco Users.

Introduction: Moist snuff smokeless tobacco (ST) products are available in the United States in both "loose" and "portioned" (ie, pouched) formats, but no published study to date has clinically evaluated the associations between ST format, use behavior, and nicotine exposure.

Aims And Methods: Participants used their usual brand of ST (loose ST [n = 30] or portioned ST [n = 20]) during an experimental visit wherein use behavior and plasma nicotine pharmacokinetic parameters were measured following single use (first hour of the session) and ad libitum use (remaining 7 h of the session). Participants' ST products were chemically characterized prior to use for pH and nicotine content.

Safety and immunogenicity of an HIV-1 prefusion-stabilized envelope trimer (Trimer 4571) vaccine in healthy adults: A first-in-human open-label, randomized, dose-escalation, phase 1 clinical trial.

Background: Advances in therapeutic drugs have increased life-expectancies for HIV-infected individuals, but the need for an effective vaccine remains. We assessed safety and immunogenicity of HIV-1 vaccine, Trimer 4571 (BG505 DS-SOSIP.664) adjuvanted with aluminum hydroxide (alum), in HIV-negative adults.

The Fumarprotocetraric Acid Inhibits Tau Covalently, Avoiding Cytotoxicity of Aggregates in Cells.

Neurodegenerative disorders, including Tauopathies that involve tau protein, base their pathological mechanism on forming proteinaceous aggregates, which has a deleterious effect on cells triggering an inflammatory response. Moreover, tau inhibitors can exert their mechanism of action through noncovalent and covalent interactions. Thus, Michael's addition appears as a feasible type of interaction involving an α, β unsaturated carbonyl moiety to avoid pathological confirmation and further cytotoxicity.

Cerebrospinal Fluid Biomarkers Are Associated With Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein and αII-spectrin Breakdown Products in Brain Tissues Following Penetrating Ballistic-Like Brain Injury in Rats.

Treatments to improve outcomes following severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) are limited but may benefit from understanding subacute-chronic brain protein profiles and identifying biomarkers suitable for use in this time. Acute alterations in the well-known TBI biomarkers glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP), αII-spectrin, and their breakdown products (BDPs) have been well established, but little is known about the subacute-chronic post-injury profiles of these biomarkers. Thus, the current study was designed to determine the extended profile of these TBI-specific biomarkers both in brain tissue and cerebral spinal fluid (CSF).